Monday Presets – Vintage New York Look

Here’s an effect that works great for portraits. It’s got that desaturated look that is often associated with the whole vintage style that’s so popular. Plus, it’s a popular effect for city (New York-ish) style photos these days. It’s primarily geared toward portraits. One thing you’ll notice if you look at the settings after you apply it, is that I bumped up the Orange and Yellows in the HSL panel to bring back some life to the skin (you gotta love Lightroom). As I mentioned earlier, this is mainly geared towards portraits but give it a try on other types of photos as I’ve gotten some really fantastic results.

Matt is the Vice President of Photography for onOne Software and a Tampa-based photographer. He's a best selling author of over 20 books and teaches Lightroom and Photoshop at seminars and conferences around the world.

When I click on Matt’s Pano Print Template.Irtemplate, I get this message ” Error importing ” Matt’s Pano Print Template.Irtemplate. The preset file was the wrong type of preset”. What am I doing incorrectly?

Hey, I was just at the Sublime Light website and saw a sample of your NY vintage preset. I absolutely love it! Unfortunately, I don’t have Lightroom yet. Is there a way to download it to PS CS3 or can you create the same effect in CS3 for us that don’t have it yet? Thanks!

Hi Matt, your NY preset is simply wonderful…i love the desaturation look resulted by this preset…this is now my ‘fitst to go’ preset…I did small modification to suit my needs, basically by increasing the clarity and contrast…the results can be seen here: http://www.pbase.com/aaregar/macy
(pictures taken last month at the Macy’s Parade in NY)…

Matt, I recently took a number of photos at a nature center festival that focused on the period 1900-1920. Your vintage New York presets were perfect for putting those photos back in time! Many thanks!!